You Know I Love You
by telemetries
Summary: Shuichi finds Yuki in his bed with a cold, and is charged with cooking him some breakfast. Yuki also utters something Shuichi never thought he'd hear him say -- kinda cutesy, kinda dumb, but it's not meant to be serious. Happy reading!


_This one-shot is actually a REALLY late Christmas present for dear old Chidori Shinatawa. I think the title also applies to her as well...er, yeah. Well, without further ado, enjoy! 3_

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**You Know I Love You **

_(otherwise known as: Shuichi Learns To Cook, and Yuki Is Slightly Delusional But He Means Whatever He Says, Goddammit.)_

"Yuki! Get up!"

A sudden splash of sunlight covered the entirety of the living room as Shuichi Shindou thrust the curtains apart. The community around Yuki's apartment was clean, tidy, and white, as per usual. Flowers bloomed in Mr. Next Door's garden, and Mr. Next Door's cat was currently trotting through them, the pads of her feet lightly trodding the petunias.

Shuichi let out a sigh after listening closely for any signs of life within the apartment other than his own. He walked over to his lover's bedroom and slowly turned the doorknob, his fingers slow and tentative as they twisted round the metal. He pushed the door open, and crept inside as silently as he could. Unfortunately, Yuki's jeans were cast on the floor, and Shuichi didn't notice until his foot got caught in them and he fell over backwards.

"Ahh!"

Even after a loud thump sounded off in the room, accompanied with Shuichi's shout, Yuki still didn't wake up. Shuichi sat up quickly, and scowled at the lazy bastard in their bed.

_Loser. _

"Yuki, come on!" Shuichi said, getting up on his knees and shuffling over to Yuki's bedside, placing his warm hands on the writer's shoulders. "You promised we could go to the park this morning. I wanted to feed the ducks, remember?"

Yuki mumbled something into his pillow.

"What?"

More mumbling. If it was at all possible, it was even less coherent.

"Yuki -- _what_?"

Yuki turned his head towards Shuichi, and the younger man nearly jumped out of his skin. Frankly, Yuki looked like pure unsaturated _hell_.

"I _said _--"

But before he could say anything at all, Yuki sneezed. He covered his nose with his hand, but it didn't stop bits of saliva and snot from spraying onto Shuichi's t-shirt. Shuichi stared at his boyfriend, slightly surprised. Why, Yuki hardly ever got sick! Okay, actually, that was a lie -- there was the time he spit up blood, the time he fainted dead away into his own marble table, that other time he stumbled in drunk with several twigs and leaves in his hair, for which he had no explanation, and then he puked on the doormat --

"Uh, Yuki? Are you -- are you sick or something?"

Yuki stared him down, and Shuichi immediately felt stupid.

"Okay, yeah, you're sick."

"Glad you're so observant," Yuki rasped. Shuichi flinched -- he sounded like a dying animal, for fuck's sake.

"Get me some tea, would you?" Yuki continued. "And some rice. Jasmine rice."

Shuichi stared at him again. Yuki actually wanted _healthy _things? Yuki? King of All Sweets That Make Diabetics Go Into Permanent Shock? No way, it couldn't be. This guy wasn't the real Yuki, was he? No way, man! No way!

"Yuki, are you -- I mean, how hot are you?"

Shuichi leaned forward and pressed his hand to Yuki's forehead. He withdrew it as soon as his skin made contact -- the novelist was burning up.

"Yeah. Tea and rice, coming right up."

"_Jasmine _rice!" Yuki rasped angrily, looking up as Shuichi walked away. Shuichi flapped his hand at his lover nonchalantly, as if to say _yeah, yeah. I got you. _He closed Yuki's door behind him and stepped into the living room, en route to the kitchen. As soon as Shuichi got there, he realised something.

He didn't actually know how to _cook. _Much less heat up water.

"Oh shit," he muttered, placing his hand over his mouth. "Shit, shit, _shit_!"

_Okay, calm down, _he thought to himself. _It can't be that hard, right? Nah, shouldn't be! Just stick the water in the teapot, heat it up a little bit, then do the same with the rice, except -- oh, you put that in an actual pot, that's right -- okay, then I just -- heat that up. Right. Can't be too hard, _he repeated to himself, trying to instill it in his head that it really was not that hard. Only, it really did seem that hard, especially for someone who had never actually cooked in his life.

"All right, let's get started."

Shuichi bent down and rooted through the cupboard below the counter until he found the china teapot. Once he got it out, he set it underneath the faucet and let the water run while he searched the upper cabinets for the bag of rice -- _jasmine _rice, of course. He found it, eventually -- on the topmost shelf.

"Aw, damn it," Shuichi said under his breath, annoyed. He switched off the faucet before the teapot overflowed, and grabbed a chair from the dining room for him to stand upon. He climbed on it, the chair wobbling a bit.

"Ahh!" he hissed, willing himself to not fall. He shut his eyes for a few moments, and didn't open them until he heard a hearty sneeze from Yuki's room, one that jerked him back to reality.

"Okay, stop daydreaming," he ordered himself. "You're a successful musician making breakfast for your poor, sick, hotter-than-hell novelist boyfriend. That is what's going on. Now stick to it, and stop being stupid."

Shuichi stopped himself. He was already being stupid just by talking to himself in this huge-ass kitchen, one foot on the chair and the other knee on the counter. He shook his head and grabbed the bag of jasmine rice before climbing down. As soon as he reached the cold tiles, he swung the bag down on the counter.

As soon as he did so, a little seam in the bag burst open and jasmine rice spat out of the hole, covering his chest and lower waist.

"What -- what the fuck -- how the hell --?" Shuichi sputtered, annoyed and embarrassed. He cleaned himself off, then got out the broom and dustpan from the nearby closet and swept up the mess, cursing Yuki to higher heaven and the seventh level of hell.

"Dammit, Yuki, you know I can't cook!" Shuichi spat. "Stupid tea -- stupid rice -- _jasmine _rice, of course -- why couldn't you have just wanted something that could be microwaved? Oh wait, I don't know how to use one of those either. Never mind. Takeout, then! Suki's is open, I could have ordered you something -- oh, but I don't have any money anyway, and you won't give me any, because you're a cheapskate loser --"

Shuichi stopped himself. He was doing it again.

"DAMMIT!" he yelled. He swept up the rice with ferocious speed, then dumped it in the bin and went back to the counter. He bent down and got a pot from underneath the sink and placed that on the stove as well as the teapot. He set the teapot to a low heat, then he remembered he needed to put water in the actual pot for the rice.

"Right," he mumbled, and turned the faucet on again. He didn't shut it off until the pot had been filled to the brim with cool, clear water. He took it out from under the faucet and slowly set it on the stove, water sloshing a bit from the sides.

_Maybe I put in too much. _

"Oh well," he muttered. Shuichi grabbed the bag of jasmine rice and poured a reasonable amount into the pot -- and by reasonable, a bowlful, maybe a little more -- if this came out good, he might want some too. He set that to low heat as well, then grabbed a magasine and sat down at the counter, checking the pot behind him to make sure nothing overflowed or blew up, like what happened with his mother's kitchen last year on Christmas.

Moments later, the teapot began whistling. Shuichi nearly yelled out in shock, then he remembered that the whistling meant it was done.

Shuichi walked over to the stove, then he stared blankly at the teapot, which continued whistling shrilly.

"Shh!" he said, and bent to the teapot. "Be quiet! Stop it! Or you'll wake up -- "

"TURN THE DAMNED STOVE OFF!"

Yuki's throaty yell echoed throughout the house, and Shuichi became aware of how stupid he must look talking to a whistling teapot when all he had to do was switch the knob off.

"Oh."

He turned it off and took the teapot off of the stove, setting it on the counter. Shuichi grabbed a cup from the dishwasher and filled it with the steaming water. He went back to the stove, and grabbed the box of Bancha green tea that was sitting next to the bread bin. He viewed the rice, which was starting to boil a little bit. Then a moment of panic hit him -- wasn't he supposed to wait till the water started boiling _before _he put the rice in?

Shuichi viewed the pot. The rice looked okay -- it wasn't turning into something like a mutant animal or anything.

_It should be okay. _

Shuichi went back to the tea and poured in a packet. He stirred it for a bit until it actually looked like tea. He peered into the cup, and bit his lower lip. It was sort of murky, but maybe that's what it was supposed to look like. How the hell did he know; he never made tea in his life! Shuichi never really drank it that much, either -- he liked coffee, which was officially banned from the machines at N-G Productions because of how hyper it made him.

He looked back to the rice, and thought it looked done. He stirred it for a bit with a spoon from the utensil drawer. It was slightly stuck together, but a few stirs eventually forced the rice apart, and Shuichi thought it looked nice and white -- possibly even edible. He put a little rice on the spoon, then slipped it out of the water and bravely stuck the spoon in his mouth, prying the rice off with his teeth and tongue.

Shuichi swallowed. It actually didn't taste that bad.

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Yuki was now sitting up in bed, tissues littering his blankets and sheets. He felt half-drunk, half-dizzy, and fully sick. His chest was congested, and his forehead felt like someone had applied hot coals to it. He reached up to feel it now, expecting blisters or welts or something else like that. Yuki supposed he shouldn't have been surprised when there was nothing there.

He was about to get up and see what the kid was up to when he pushed the door open. His slender hands held a tray that had a cup of steaming hot tea on it, along with a bowl of steaming hot jasmine rice and a pair of chopsticks sticking out.

Yuki stared as Shuichi walked over, humming to himself and looking upon his boyfriend with a kind smile.

"Here you go!" Shuichi said happily, sticking the tray in Yuki's lap.

Yuki stared at Shuichi a little longer before slowly taking the chopsticks and picking up some rice. He waited a moment, peering at the long, slim grains that lay patiently in between the smooth metal of the sticks. Swallowing painfully, Yuki opened his mouth and stuck the rice in his mouth, not bothering to hesitate another moment.

He chewed for a second, then swallowed.

Shuichi looked at him expectantly, his large plum-coloured eyes boring into Yuki.

Yuki blinked a few times, then he continued to eat. Shuichi smiled and clapped his hands happily, sitting next to his lover after shoving all the tissues aside in the nearby trashcan. He settled his head on Yuki's shoulder, and settled there after he was sure that Yuki wasn't going to shove him off.

"Hey."

Shuichi immediately sat up.

"What? Is there something wrong with the rice? I'll fix it next time, I promise -- oh God, I actually thought I did something right this time; you hate it, don't you! I'm sorry, Yuki!"

Before Shuichi could say anything more, Yuki cut him off with a quick kiss.

"You know I love you, right?"

Shuichi sputtered, then choked a little. Oh man -- Yuki was _really _sick if he was saying things like that.

Still...a warm feeling filled Shuichi's chest. He _knew _that Yuki loved him, of course -- but he'd never actually heard the man_ say _it. And even if Yuki said it while sick, it still sort of meant something to Shuichi.

"...I love you too, Yuki," Shuichi responded. He looked to his lover, who had -- surprise! -- fallen asleep. His tray was holding steady on his long legs, and Shuichi removed it so he could help Yuki lay down properly, smoothing his hair back as he did so.

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A week later, Yuki was back on his feet and healthy as a horse, and of course, he and Shuichi were having a stupid argument over the television.

"Why can't we ever watch what I want to watch? I watch some cool things too!"

"It's my television, kid. I watch what I want to. When you get your own TV, then you can watch whatever pussy shit you like watching whenever you feel like it. Until then, I feel like seeing the game."

"Yuki, that is so mean. I thought you loved me! You said you did!"

"What? I never said that. You're delusional. Are you sure it was me who was sick last week? And stop trying to steal the remote; you're not getting it!"

Yuki snatched the remote out of Shuichi's grasp. The younger man sat back in the sofa, scowling, but then a secret grin crept up upon his face. Whatever -- he didn't care what Yuki said, he could deny it all he wanted. He still knew that Yuki loved him, without a doubt, and him saying it just made Shuichi feel ten times the man he was before. Dammit, he had _balls_! He felt like a _king_! And he had a knight in shining armor as well -- one who loved him very much.

Shuichi was about to try and take a nap and dream of these pleasant things when a sudden thought struck him. He sat up and frowned.

Yuki never did say how that tea came out.

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_Yeah, it's short, sweet, kinda dumb. But I like it. Anyway. Review if you wish. Have a great day! _


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